Chapin Garden Seeder with 6 Seed Plates, Model# 8701B

Oh my goodness! This is fantastic! My husband and I are in our late 60’s and we both LOVE to have a garden in the summer. It has been getting harder and harder on us to plant one and we would have to plant a couple of rows at a time and then rest for the day and then do it again the next day. With this seeder we were able to do half of our large garden in the time it would have taken us to do two rows before! It’s lightweight, easy to handle and keeps the rows fairly straight. I feel like the cost of the seeder is very good and it is easy to use, easy to understand. If you have trouble like we do….buy this…..you won’t regret it!

Love this product

We purchased to use in our large scale home garden; corn, veggies, sunflowers, pollinators, and herbs. Although most seeds did work well, we ended up having to plant some by hand (all sunflowers) and most of the smaller seeds.It was still extremely helpful and less back breaking but you do have to manipulate some seeds to truly gain all of the benefits. We live in zone 7 of the growing map in the US, with hard red clay as our base soil, rotter tilled with tractor and still had to add some brut strength behind the seeder to actually plant and pull the soil back over.

NOTE: Some the most common complaints I noticed had to to with failure to plant or clogging the seed chute....Soil preparation and condition are paramount...the soil must be loose and free of debris and not too wet so that that the furrow opener and furrow closer can function smoothly .....improperly tilled soil with a lot of loose grass will prevent planting and germination and growth by poor seed depth and lack of firm soil to seed contact.Quality is the bare minimum needed to function, probably best for a beginner or experienced gardener who wants a seeder without breaking the bank....Most all others within this price range $120-$180 are virtually identical ....the next level higher in quality is probably The 'Hoss' brand which is $500-$600.The worst aspects of the seeder is that it uses thin flat metal and the left side of the upright to the handle was bent toward the hopper in shipping ...the slight bend caused it to be too close the plastic hopper and the one of the bolts need to be inserted such that the threaded end would not rub on the plastic hopper and cause damage...even if bent back to the proper position the flat rail was by design too close as you can tell by the sleeve spacer located on the equivalent handle bolts on the right side....even with the bolt reversed it would be wise to insert some sort of protective cushion between the bolt hex head and the plastic hopper. There is some advantage that parts of it are made of plastic as it won't rust. I think the seed plate should have a better means of attachment...it seems like it is prone to coming loose especially if seeds build up behind the face of the plate and push the plate away from the housing. For the most part it should work ok for you if you use it with care, clean and store after planting and use a bit of finesse or as my Grandpa used to say ".....hold you mouth right....."

Very responsive manufacturer. Had a broken sprocket. Manufacturer madenit right. No hassle

Does not work well. I have used it on sandy soil with no rocks. The soil is to soft to turn the wheels. And on clay soil with rocks it tries to bury up to deep. Also I have tried with several different seeds and the singulation is terrible. Might have 3 seeds per spot or none. It is a piece of garbage to me. Also the row marker is useless and annoying it doesn't have enough weight to mark and it just gets in the way and flops everywhere. Save your money on this item.

This product worked like a charm! I'm a new-to-farming-Gen-X "oldster" and needed a foolproof way of planting my flower seeds...sunflower, dahlias, zinnias, peonies and wildflowers. Each seed comes in so many different sizes so the easy to switch out discs were a breeze to use.I'm not even joking when it comes to using this thing. I'm about 5'7 and out-of-shape and pushing the Chapin Seed Planter was easy, the occasional rock or two in the soil might slow down progress but most rocks the wheel just ran right on over and kept on going. I wasn't strained, nor did I ever have to fight with this Planter, I thought it was a bit flimsy out of the box but really it's a magnificent device designed to save your back and your soul. Who knew?I had help from my 13 year old assembling the handle, which helps with two people but one person could do it alone. I think overall for the value, the time saved by not having to bend over and move row to row is truly what makes this nifty little seed planter so great. Can't imagine I'd be able to walk if I had to do it all by hand. Save your back and some money.

Very easy to put together. This came in time .